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As the 11th richest person in the world, John Walton could have traveled the globe on luxury jets.

Instead, the Wal-Mart fortune heir loved to take to the skies in an experimental plane built from a kit.

While a Cessna business jet he used sat on a runway at the Jackson Hole, Wyo., airport Monday, Walton took off in the plane, powered by a gas engine similar to those in snowmobiles.

A third of a mile from the runway, the craft went into a steep dive and crashed in Grand Teton National Park, killing the 58-year-old educator and outdoorsman.

“He was the kind of guy you’d never imagine had $20 billion,” said Michael Collins, a flight instructor at the airport. “He didn’t put on airs, you know what I mean? He could have just been one of the guys.”

Walton was the son of Sam Walton, who founded the Wal-Mart discount store chain that became one of the world’s biggest companies.

In March, Forbes magazine listed John Walton as the 11th richest person in the world, with a net worth of $18.2 billion. Walton was tied with his younger brother, Jim, and one spot behind his older brother, Rob, who is the company’s chairman.

John, who lived in Jackson Hole, was a major advocate of school vouchers. In 1998, he founded the Children’s Scholarship Fund to provide low-income families with money to send their children to private schools.

The foundation started with $67 million from the Walton Family Foundation and has benefited more than 67,000 children.

In addition to serving on the Wal-Mart board, Walton also founded True North Partners, a Big Apple-based venture-capital firm.

“He was kind of the all-American boy that got rich but never changed and tried to use his money to help other people,” said ex-Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, who served with Walton on the Children’s Scholarship Fund board.

“I certainly have nothing negative to say about the man at all. He was a prince,” said his ex-wife, Mary Ann Gunn. “He loved to build things. He loved motorcycles. He built his own motorcycle.”

The plane in which Walton died weighed 400 to 500 pounds, had an aluminum frame and wings covered in fabric similar to heavy-duty sail cloth.

Such planes, which the FAA classifies as experimental, can be made from kits or from plans, where the builder buys or manufactures all the parts and assembles them.

The aircraft, which range in price from $5,000 to $100,000, can carry up to 60 gallons of gas and go up to 300 mph.

Experimental planes are distinguished from ultralight aircraft, which weigh no more than 254 pounds, carry only five gallons of gas and have a top speed of 65 mph,

Singer John Denver died in October 1997 in an experimental plane called a Long-EZ.

It could not be learned if Walton built his plane or bought it from someone else.

The cause of the crash was under investigation.

Authorities said Walton died on impact. The wings of the plane were intact. The tail broke from the rest of the plane but also remained intact.

Unlike his father, Walton didn’t pursue a business career.

He attended the College of Wooster in Wooster, Ohio, dropping out after two years. He then joined the Army, serving as a medic with the Green Berets during the Vietnam War.

Asked why he joined the Special Forces, he said: “I figured if you’re going to do something, you should do it the best you can.”

Walton was awarded the Silver Star, the third-highest U.S. medal for valor, for saving members of his unit while under enemy fire.

When Walton returned to the United States, his father wanted him to join the family business.

But Walton chose to work as a crop duster and boat builder before founding the venture-capital firm.

“He’s the most independent of the bunch and the only one who doesn’t live here in Arkansas, and he’s a tremendous individual,” the father wrote in his autobiography, “Sam Walton: Made in America.”

In the biography, John Walton is quoted as saying his father encouraged him to pursue anything he wanted.

“When I was a young man trying to find my way in the world, he gave me an open invitation to join the Wal-Mart team, but never a hint of pressure,” he said. “What a wonderful way to grow up.”

Walton led the family foundation to donate at least $700 million to education-related causes between 1998 and 2004.

“He saw education as sort of the great equalizer for opportunity in this country,” said Don Shalvey, head of Aspire Public Schools, an Oakland, Calif., organization that operates 14 charter schools in California.

He “took a very wide approach with public education.”

Between 2000 and 2008, the Walton Family Foundation will have donated almost $6 million to Aspire, making it one of the group’s biggest benefactors, Shalvey said.

In an interview with Fortune, Walton explained, “Education is a $700-plus-billion-a-year industry. By additive and incremental spending you are not going to move that environment.

“We aren’t trying to change public schools. We are trying to change the education environment so that public schools have to change for the better.”

It has allowed children from low-income families to attend private and parochial schools in 38 towns and cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Washington and Chicago.

“John Walton was one of the great philanthropists of all time,” Forstmann said. “Through his generosity, tens of thousands of children are receiving a quality education. His passion for creating equal opportunity for all children was unmatched.”

Walton was also a donor to the Committee for Quality Education, a pro-school choice group, giving more than $340,000 in 2001 and 2002.

Despite his fortune, “he had no ego in this game, which is why he was so revered,” said Dan Peters, chairman of the Philanthropy Roundtable, of which Walton was also a part.

In addition to serving on the Wal-Mart board, Walton was on a company committee that reviews company finances and oversees long-range planning.

But he was not widely regarded as being a potential successor to his brother.

He attended shareholder meetings but generally limited his activities to waving to the crowd while his older brother conducted the meetings.

The Walton family requested that in lieu of flowers, donations be made in John Walton’s name to the Alliance for School Choice, in Phoenix; the Children’s Scholarship Fund, in New York; and Teton Science School in Kelly, Wyo.

Light flight

* John Walton was flying an “experimental aircraft” that weighed 400 to 500 pounds, had an aluminum frame and fabric-covered wings.

* There are 26,000 experimental aircraft or “homebuilts” in the United States

* They can hold up to 60 gallons of fuel and fly up to 300 mph.

* They range in price from $5,000 to $100,000.

* The accident rate of experimental planes is less than 1 percent.

* Homebuilts are different from “ultralight” planes, which weigh no more than 254 pounds and have a top speed of 60 to 65 mph.